Sir Martin Sorrell, who has been under investigation for “personal misconduct” has stepped down as Chief Executive Officer of WPP with immediate effect. Roberto Quarta, Chairman of WPP, becomes Executive Chairman until the appointment of a new Chief Executive Officer. As per a release issued by WPP, the previously announced investigation into an allegation of misconduct against Sir Martin has concluded. The allegation did not involve amounts that are material.

Ford Motor Co has called for a pitch for its global creative duties. The account is currently handled by WPP’s GTB division. It is learnt that Ford’s China business, Ford Lincoln and Ford’s US dealer business are not part of this review. Ford has had a 75-year long association with WPP agencies that goes back to 1943.

While long-format ads have been backed by marketers across the globe for their excellence in storytelling, the trend of 6-second ads or bumper ads is being mostly observed in the Asia-Pacific region, with most of the brands from India, Japan and Korea trying their hand in it. Piyush Pandey, Alyque Padamsee, Sabuj Sengupta debate on the effectiveness of bumper ads and weigh in their pros and cons.

Star India has claimed a historic opening for the 11th edition of IPL with 371 million viewers recorded on television and Hotstar. The television viewership stood at 288.4 million viewers (BARC 2+ U+R) and a platform reach of 82.4 million viewers on Hotstar – the highest ever inaugural week viewership recorded for IPL since its launch.

Most of the top 10 Hindi GECs, with the exception of Rishtey, saw decline in gross viewership in this IPL season as per BARC ratings for Week 15 of 2018 (April 7-13) [HSM (U+R) : NCCS All : 2+ Individuals]. The see-saw battle for the No. 1 spot between Zee Anmol and Star Bharat continues, with the former claiming this spot in Week 15. Colors slid to its lowest rank of No. 8 in Rural+Urban ever since BARC came into being.

Zoom, part of the Times Network, has announced one of the biggest-ever brand partnerships in Indian television, with online fashion e-tailer Myntra. Starting at 9 pm tonight (April 19, 2018), Zoom will unveil its new avatar – ‘Zoom styled by Myntra’, making a transition from being just a TV channel to a platform agnostic entertainment destination.

It was on April 18, 2017 that Sony YAY!, the kids’ entertainment channel from Sony Pictures Networks, India, went live. Targeted at kids in the 2-14 age group, Sony YAY! has been engaging kids with through content and stories produced in India as well as through various endeavours. As the channel celebrates its first birthday, it has announced a power-packed 2018 slate with 10 new made for TV movies along with special new holiday episodes this summer.

It is learnt that Toonami, the kids’ channel from Turner International India, will be wrapped up from May 15, 2018. The channel was launched in February 2015 and positioned as a home for high-octane animated action and superheroes. Toonami has also been shut down in the 14 Asia-Pacific countries, including Singapore, Philippines, Thailand, Hong Kong, Indonesia and Sri Lanka since last month. Turner has not disclosed the reason for shutting down the Toonami channel.

Publicis Groupe has reported net revenue of €2,082 million euro in Q1 2018, down 8.2 per cent from €2,267 million in 2017. However, net revenue grew by +1.6 per cent at constant exchange rates. Organic growth was +1.6 per cent in Q1 2018 after reaping the benefits of accounts gained in 2017, notably McDonald’s, Diesel, Lionsgate, Bradesco and Southwest.

Indian IT and FMCG behemoth, Wipro, has shifted/awarded major part of its Consumer Care media business to Lodestar UM. The decision comes on the heels of an extensive and exhaustive multi-agency pitch. Under the new arrangement, in addition to Santoor that consists over 70 per cent of Wipro’s media spends, Lodestar UM will also handle Chandrika and Enchanteur range of products.

TRA’s Brand Trust Report 2018 (BTR 2018), a syndicated research conducted amongst 2,488 consumer-influencers across 16 cities in India, puts Samsung as India’s Most Trusted Brand second year in a row. Sony and LG follow to retain pole positions as India’s second and third Most Trusted Brands in an encore of 2017.

In an interaction with Adgully, N Chandramouli, CEO, TRA Research, the brand intelligence and data insights company that has been carrying out the research for eight years, speaks about the importance of building brand trust, categories that have seen a rise in the trust index, brands that have not matched up to consumers’ functional expectations and more.

After arrests in Bangalore and Telangana earlier this year for tampering of BARC viewership data, now cases have been registered against seven people in Gwalior on charges of tampering BARC sample households and data manipulation in Madhya Pradesh in favour of a particular Hindi TV news channel. Madhavganj Police in Gwalior has arrested three of the seven alleged offenders based on a complaint filed by Hansa Research Pvt Ltd.

Come summers and a large part of India is faced with the problem of water scarcity. This has been on the rise in recent years. In light of this, water purifier brand Livpure’s campaign, titled ‘Cutting Paani’, which has been conceptualised by Famous Innovation, gives out a simple yet innovative message to stop wastage of water.

The W-Suite | Sherina Kapany, Founder sunSTRATEGIC, is a true entrepreneur at heart, a seasoned business development executive, with international experience in establishing market penetration strategies in B2B and consumer marketing environments for Fortune 500 and 1000 and Global 2000 companies and the private sector.

Offbeat: Chirag Joshi, Head of Marketing, Samco Securities, is a marketing professional with extensive experience in revenue generation, brand solutions, client relationship management and conceptualising media properties with India’s leading media brands. Being a multi-tasker, Joshi is now heading overall brand and marketing communications department at Samco.

Ad land’s Young Guns: Nayan Popatia, Strategist – SEO, iProspect India, has 6 years of experience spread across the digital space. He has honed his skills towards a data driven and analytical approach in SEO and content. During his stint at iProspect India, he has crafted strategies that showed results in innovation and creativity.

The Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity (June 18-22) has released details of the 2018 Festival schedule. Built around the new Tracks system, which unites the learning programme and awards structure, the 2018 Festival schedule will equip audiences with the knowledge and foresight they need in a constantly evolving communication industry.

Every year, for last many years, numerous prima donnas of advertising and creative gurus have tried their luck in branching out and building their own brand of advertising agencies. But the unfortunate reality is most of them have failed or sold their ‘little child’ out. The survival rate (at least for a five year time period) in this industry is less than 10 per cent, writes Tapas Gupta, Founder & MD, BEI Confluence Communication Ltd.